Page 50 - Demo

CHAPTER 6 / MUST YOU INVENT? A POX ON CREATIVITYNO B.S. Guide to Succeeding in Business by Breaking All the Rules 85and I can often work with those, without actually, physically raiding the file cabinets in the corner. But the process is the same. The method is the same: stitching together already tested, proven, effective material, NOT creating anything from scratch.Incidentally, I%u2019m NOT suggesting copyright infringement or outright theft of protected intellectual property. Every good copywriter has a %u201cswipe file%u201d and uses that slang term to describe it%u2014but what we mean is borrowing, combining, integrating, and modifying (rather than creating), so that our new whole is sufficiently different from any of the parts so as not to violate any laws or ethical considerations. However, there are very formulaic approaches to good advertising. For example, there%u2019s a very famous, no longer copyright-protected headline originally written by John Caples over sixty years ago: %u201cThey Laughed When I Sat Down at the Piano%u2014But When I Started to Play.%u201d This has been, and should be, much copied over the years. For example, one of my own borrowings: %u201cEverybody Laughed When I Said I%u2019d Never Work for Somebody Else Again%u2014but I Sure Had the Last Laugh. My Story of Financial Freedom Could Become Yours, Too. Here%u2019s How.%u201d This headline was for a very successful direct-mail campaign I put together for a client selling homebased business information.Anyway, in the advertising business, I all too often see creativity for creativity%u2019s sake being put ahead of the clients%u2019 interests or the desire for results. Worshiping at the altar of creativity blinds people to easier, more straightforward, less risky opportunities. Overrating the importance of creativity holds many people back from pursuing opportunity.Sometimes creativity backfires.There%u2019s a very big, long-established U.S. company I%u2019m not going to name here that had the same famous logo for over 50 years. When a new president came in, he was looking around for things to change%u2014I think to sort of stake out his territory and demonstrate his authority, the way an animal stakes out his territory by urinating on its border. He brought all the internal marketing folks and his ad agency people